Our Family's Journey Through Time
Notes:
Beckley is a city in and the county seat of Raleigh County, West Virginia, United States. The population was 17,286 at the 2020 census. It is the principal city of the Beckley metropolitan area of Southern West Virginia, home to 115,079 residents in 2020. Beckley was founded on April 4, 1838, and was long known for its ties to the coal mining industry. It is the home of the West Virginia University Institute of Technology, as well as campuses of Concord University and the University of Charleston.[7]
History
Beckley Centennial Medal
The area surrounding Beckley was long home to many indigenous peoples. Early encounters describe the land as being an ancestral home of the Catawba-speaking Moneton people, who referred to the surrounding area as Okahok Amai, and were allies of the Monacan people.[8] The Moneton's Catawba speaking neighbors to the south, the Tutelo (since absorbed into the Seneca-Cayuga Nation[9]) may have absorbed surviving Moneton communities, and claim the area as ancestral lands. Cherokee and Shawnee and Yuchi peoples also claim the area as included in their traditional lands.[10] Waves of conflict and displacement connected to European settler-colonial conquest also resulted in varied communities finding home and refuge in southern West Virginia, becoming identified as Mingo ? remote affiliates of the Iroquois Confederacy.[11]
Beckley was named in honor of John James Beckley, who was the first Clerk of the House of Representatives and the first Librarian of Congress. It was founded by his son, Alfred Beckley (US Army lieutenant and brigadier general of Virginia militia), who was from the District of Columbia.
Although founded in 1838, Beckley existed only on paper at that time, "Alfred Beckley said he "was frequently jeered and laughed at for his Paper Town..."[12] Early in its history, the town was known as Beckley, Raleigh Court House, and, occasionally, Beckleyville.
The town was originally located in Fayette County, Virginia. In 1850 the act of the Virginia legislature creating Raleigh County named Beckley the county seat.
The city is sometimes called the "Smokeless Coal Capital", "The City of Champions" and the "Gateway To Southern West Virginia."[citation needed]
During the presidential primaries of 1960, the vehicles of rivals John F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey stopped at the same streetcorner in Beckley. Recognizing each other, the two men got out and chatted briefly.[13]
Latitude: 000000, Longitude: -81.188056Matches 1 to 1 of 1
Last Name, Given Name(s)  |
Death  |
Person ID | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  Shirley, Dr. Reginald King | 5 Jun 1954 | Bekley, Raleigh County, West Virginia, United States | I16740 |
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